Music 32, syllabus
Professor Móricz
Arms Music Building
Room 212
T/TH 10:00-11:20 AM
Sections TBA, Nathan Olson (nolson10@amherst.edu)
Required text:
—W. A. Mozart, Sonatas and Fantasies for the Piano, ed. Nathan Broder (Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania: Theodor Presser Company, 1960), pick it up at Amherst Books ($19.95)
—Anthology of additional music [handed out in class]
—Listening: on course website (e-reserves)
In this course we’ll study different manifestations of form and formal principles in music, along with the relationship of form to harmony and tonality. We’ll start with pre-tonal music (Lassus), then move to contrapuntal tonal music (Bach), and spend most of our time on the so-called “classical” repertory of Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven. At the end we’ll look at the transformation of late eighteenth-century formal and tonal principles in nineteenth-century music.
Work:
For every class you'll have to prepare by completing the assigned reading; analyzing music; complete assignments. We'll go over assignments in class. You might have extra practical assignments for sections. At the end of units you'll be tested on your knowledge.
Attendance Policy:
Music 34 is a seminar where active class participation is crucial for the effectiveness of the class. I expect all students to come to all classes and all sections (both twice a week). One or two absenses will not affect your final grade directly, but for each absence beyond the first two, 3% will be substracted from your final cumulative grade.
Practice rooms
Since you’ll have to use the piano for preparing for class, I would recommend getting practice room keys at the beginning of the semester.
Final grade consists of: class participation, including assignments, section grade, end of unit tests, long projects.
Unit 1: form in songs (monophonic folk songs; popular songs)
Reading: GROVE music online, “form”
(http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/subscriber/)
from Robert Gaudlin, Harmonic Practice in Tonal Music (“Phrase Structure and Grouping”)
Mark Evan Bonds, “The Spatial Representation of Musical Form,” Journal of Musicology 27/3 (Summer 2010): 265-303 (online through library website)
Unit 2: pre-tonal music
Repertory: Lassus, 2-part motets
Final project: Lassus, Tribus miraculis (5-part) and Jesu, corona virginum (6-part) technical terms to learn: modal cadences; modes; homophony, polyphony, imitation, counterpoint, point of imitation, etc.
Memorize: modal cadences
Unit 3: Bach inventions and fugues (WTC)
Reading: GROVE, “invention,” GROVE, “fugue”
“Fugue in C Major: The Well-Tempered Clavier, book 1,” and “Fugue in C-sharp Minor: The Well=Tempered Clavier, book 1,” in Joseph Kerman, The Art of Fugue: Bach Fugues for Keyboard, 1715-1750 (Berkeley: University of California Press), 1-10, 23-32.
Final project: analysis of 5-part fugues by Bach
Unit 4: ternary forms (da capo arias from Handel’s Julio Cesare)
Reading: GROVE, “ternary form”
from Robert Gaudlin, Harmonic Practice in Tonal Music (“Simple Forms”)
Unit 5: theme and variations
Reading: GROVE, “variation” (classical period)
from Robert Gaudlin, Harmonic Practice in Tonal Music (“Simple Forms”)
Final project: analysis of Beethoven, Sonata in E, op. 109, Movement 2;
Beethoven, Sonata in c, op. 111, Movement 2, Arietta
Beethoven, Septet, Tema con variazioni
Unit 6: simple binary forms (Bach Minuets, Mozart and Haydn Menuets, etc.)
Reading: Joseph Riepel, from Fundamentals of Musical Composition (Anthology)
Heinrich Christoph Koch, from Introductory Essay on Composition (Anthology)
Excerpt from Johann Philipp Kirnberger, Der allezeit fertige Polonoisen und Menuettencomponist (Berlin, 1757)
from Robert Gaudlin, Harmonic Practice in Tonal Music (“Simple Forms”)
Final project: Beethoven, Symphony No. 5, Movement
Unit 7: symphonic binary forms (expositions; developments; recapitulations) Reading: GROVE, “sonata form”;
Final project: Beethoven, Sonata Pathétique, op. 13
Schubert, Sonata in Bb, D960
Mozart, Symphony in g, K550
Mozart, Symphony in C, “Jupiter,” K551 (movement 4)